RALEIGH!!!!

Well we did it. 3,724 miles later we have arrived in Raleigh!! It was a super easy drive from Asheville today. Took about 4 hours. Rhett was really excited to get back to his old stomping grounds.

So we'll be living with Rhett's brother for a few months until we get Rhett's house remodeled. His brother just bought a new condo and it's right in the heart of downtown, one block from Rhett's new office, so it works out perfectly.

Now the fun of unpacking begins! Uggghhhh :)

It's gonna be a big transition for Joe here in the south. He went for a run this evening and there are so many dang bugs here and they are BIG and LOUD. And Joe's not a fan of big bugs so...he might have some adventurous encounters.

Also, we had lunch in Asheville before heading out, and it's so strange for Joe to keep hearing these thick country accents. He thought people only talked like that in the movies lol. Just wait till he starts talking like that!

We hope you all enjoyed following out journey across the country. We had an amazing time and saw so many great things and met a lot of great people along the way.

We will miss all of our friends back west (or wherever you are) but we'll be back to visit and you know how to get ahold of us! And keep watching for pics. We've posted quite a few on Facebook but we have more that need to go up.

Guess that's it. It's been an amazing journey. Thanks for reading. :)

XOXO

Joe & Rhett

NORTH CAROLINA!!!!

We're here!! Well we're in North Carolina at least. We crossed over the border this afternoon and are staying in the mountains in Asheville tonight.

It was about a 4 1/2 hour drive from Nashville today. We made a couple pit stops along the way. The first was in the town of Lebanon, Tennessee. Joe's great-grandfather grew up on a farm just north of there, and the Bass family farm is still there, so we drove up just to see it and take a look at the countryside where he lived. Beautiful country.

Then we stopped in Knoxville, home of the University of Tennessee, which happens to have one of the largest college football stadiums in the country. So we drove around UT and took a bunch of pictures before heading up into the mountains.

We are staying at the coolest hotel of our trip here in Asheville. It's called the Hotel Indigo, and it's brand new. It's a boutique-kinda hotel. Very swanky :)

Met up with a couple friends for dinner tonight. Brady and Tim drove up from Greenville, South Carolina, where they live, to meet us for dinner and ice cream. So great to see them and catch up on everyone's happenings.

Howdy Ya'll From Nashville!!

It was an easy 2 1/2-ish hour drive to Nashville. Cruised in here amid kinda overcast skies but still hot as all get out and checked into our hotel. Walked up to Broadway in downtown and found some dinner at Jack's BBQ...kind of a dive but real good hometown Southern food. Then went and found the Lipstick Lounge where they were having Karaoke night! Now, these people could sing! I mean, Nashville is the music capital of the world, and these cats were givin' it to us! It was so much fun.

On Friday we got up and headed out for a day of sightseeing. First we headed up to Centennial Park to see the Parthenon. Really. There is an exact full-scale replica of the original Parthenon in Greece in the middle of this Park in Nashville. The structure was originally built in 1897 for the Tennessee Centennial and International Exposition. It was to capitalize on Nashville being known as the "Athens of the South". In the mid-2os when the structure started to crumble the city decided to rebuild it inside and out exactly like the original. Now it houses an art museum inside, complete with a 42-foot tall gold-plated statue of the goddess Athena. The whole thing is really quite the site. Guess now we can check Athens off our vacation list, since we've done that :)

And it just so happened that Vanderbilt University is located right across the street from the park so we drove through campus and Rhett got to take pictures of another stadium :)

We also went to Bicentennial Park, which has beautiful greenspaces and all kinds of plaques about Tennessee history. It also has a large outdoor amphitheater with a beautiful view right up to the state capital.

Last night we headed back up to Broadway and had dinner at Bailey's Pub. We sat up on the second floor balcony with a cool breeze and great view of the neon strip. After that we headed out with some new friends to enjoy the local music scene, and there is shortage of places to hear live music in this city. We hopped from the Cadillac Ranch to The Stage on Broadway to Roberts and on and on up and down Broadway listening to people and bands trying to make it big. Fun night!

Sightseeing in Louisville

On Thursday before rollin' out of Louisville we went a toured the Louisville Slugger bat factory. It's the only place in the world where Louisville Slugger bats are made. We actually got to walk right through the middle of the production floor and watch the work in progress. Each professional baseball player has they own custom mold and they usually order 10-12 at a time. We also got to see some of the original bats used by certain famous players like Mickey Mantle, David Ortiz, and Babe Ruth. Very cool! We even got to handle the original bats used by some of those players. Very cool!

We then stopped by the 21C Hotel in downtown Louisville. Inside the lobby is a modern art museum with some really interesting and unique pieces. One was a white wall in which letters were projected onto it and they were falling or "raining" down the wall (similar to that speed typing game you may have played on a computer). But when a person steps in front of the wall, their image is projected onto the wall with the letters and the letters interact with the person (i.e. bounce off the body). See the pics. It was so incredible!

Stormin' in Louisville!

Hey all! Well it's now Thursday morning and we just woke up to black skies here in Louisville. A thunderstorm rolled in overnight and it's pouring outside along with some crazy lightning and thunder. The weird thing is that it is still 90 degrees out.

We were glad to roll out of St. Louis yesterday. Crossed over the mighty Mississippi into Illinois and didn't stop much through the Land of Lincoln or the Hoosier State. EXCEPT we did make a little pit stop in the random town in the middle of nowhere Indiana called Santa Claus. Really. It's a whole town of all Christmas all the time. Really. Someone shoot me. The grocery store is called Holiday Foods, the lake is Rudolph Lake, and the streets are all things like Mistletoe Lane and such. There's even a huge theme park called Holiday World with roller coasters and water rides...It's kinda cool but just so random.

Cruised into Louisville yesterday afternoon and drove down to see Churchill Downs. That place is HUGE!! Took some great pictures of that and, then, OH the University of Louisville Cardinal's massive stadium was right next door so you know Rhett was all over that photo opportunity! :)

Ate dinner at this real fun Southwestern-style restaurant right on the Ohio river called Tumbleweeds and then checked out this funky little dive bar called Starbase Q 'cause they were having Karaoke night! No we didn't sing, but dang it was some good entertainment! Those people were not afraid to tear apart a country song lol!

St. Louis Isn't Real Pretty

Thankfully, it was a relatively short 4 1/2 hour drive from Kansas City to St. Louis today, but it was hot! Around 100 in St. Louis but with the humidity it felt about 115! But no, no, it is not too hot to make Joe turn around and come back, so don't ask lol!

The countryside turned from flat cornfields to rolling tree-covered hills, although it was a little unnerving that we kept hearing banjos while driving through the rural Missouri countryside.

So the first thing we did when we got to town was go and tour the Anheuser Busch plant. Rhett figured that since we toured the Coors plant in Colorado we should at least see how the Bud tour compares :) It was a great tour. One of the first things we got to see were some of the Budweiser Clydesdales. They are the most beautiful horses, and huge!

After the tour we rode up to the top of the Gateway Arch. It is the most incredible sculpture. It's 630 feet tall, and you ride up to the top in these tiny, claustrophobic little gondolas that seat five people, barely. I mean by the time you get to the top, you're basically family. :) The view from the top is incredible. They say you can see almost 30 miles on a clear day. We certainly could see right into Busch Stadium where the Cardinals were playing the Astros today. Who needs tickets?? Just bring a pair of binoculars to the top of the arch and you're good to go!

Now, other than the aforementioned two locales, the rest of St. Louis is basically a bust. It's just not a very attractive city. We weren't impressed. It's very industrial, dirty, stinky...I mean we drove around for awhile tonight checkin' things out and finding food and such and so much of the city just looks really rundown. Maybe we were just in the wrong parts of town, but if so, then there's a lot of wrong parts of town!!

Bed, gym, then a 3-state sprint to Louisville tomorrow!!

Trip to Kansas City

Today was Denver to Kansas City and we started the day stopping by the Broncos stadium.


Ok so let's get straight to the point.... We just wasted 9hrs of our lives!! Umm yeah eastern Colorado and the ENTIRE state of Kansas was boring. No wonder they like basketball cause there is nothing else to do. Well ok there is corn,wheat and sunflowers. Rhett had the quote of the trip" what do they do with all those sunflowers?" and Joe says ummm haven't u eaten sunflowers seeds... Oh yeah there are those :)



We only had to take one picture and it's the same scene the whole day :)

We did see the hometown of Bob Dole(which was blah just like his personality). We drove on the original 8 miles of interstate in the country and according to the map were in the geographical center of the USA. We fell asleep while coming into Kansas so we missed the welcome sign so u can pretend we have that picture.

Joe also got his first real dose of the HEAT!! But he seemed to like it.

Well until tomorrow,its off to St Louis and 100 degree weather.


-J&R
Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Denver Day #2

Day #2 in Denver was great! We met up with our friends Kevin and Eric and headed out to Coors field to watch the Rockies play the Cubs. We had great seats. 12th row, right down the first base line. And right under the beating sun. It was so hot! Then right around the 4th or 5th inning the clouds rolled in to give us some reprieve from the heat. We thought we'd be in good foul ball territory, and there were a couple that came close, but no luck. It was a great game though, and the Rockies held fast and ended up winning 8-7.

Afterwards we went to the beer bust at The Wrangler. Ooh, that was people-watching at its finest lol. Finally, we were starving so we found this fun little dive restaurant/bar after driving around Denver getting lost for 45 minutes with our "local" friends here hahaha.

Out in Denver Day#1

Here we are in the fresh and cool morning air in Denver trying to decide what to do. We each got to choose one thing to do so who chose what? Well Rhett thought what better way to start your day than driving a few miles to Golden, CO-yes thats right the home of Coors Brewing!!! (Surprise Rhett chose this)

We toured the brewery and sampled a few beers while learning about the brewing process. We also discovered that we should steal a rail car of beer- it would be worth a 6 pack a day for 90 years!!!! ummm wow :) We toured the town of Golden which was also awesome and quaint, complete with para-gliders jumping off the mountain and a rafting creek through the center of town.

Then it was on to Water World!! Sunny and 85 degrees was the perfect weather for a day in the sun and water. After seeing many Lycra Infractions and laughing out loud that wearing a bikini is a privilege not a right we had a GREAT TIME at the park. Joe especially liked the slide that was a straight drop to the bottom(about an 80' drop) and we wish we had pictures of his face the first time he went down. Although we got a little burnt (Mom no comments about sunscreen...we got it) we needed the sun. Ya know we were Pac Northwesterners so it was in style to be pasty white-however no more :)

We went out on the town last night with our great friends here in Denver, fun times indeed. Thats another day in the life so until tomorrow......

Salt Lake City to Denver

Hey all! Sorry we're a couple days behind getting this blog up, but we'll get you all up to speed. Well just as we figured out Utah's complicated-to-figure-out-but-easy-to-understand-once-you-do street numbering system, we left. We had a loooonnnnng drive to Denver on Friday. Left Salt Lake a little later than planned 'cause we stopped in Provo and took in the sites of the BYU campus. Once on the road we enjoyed the mostly sunny drive and the beautiful scenery. We stopped a few times in such beautiful places as Grand Junction and Vail to stretch our legs and eat. Rhett's real excited now that we're back in Chick-Fil-A country! :) Once up into the Rockies we passed through a couple major thunderstorms, but there was a double rainbow!! (LOL for those of you who have seen the video on YouTube).

We went over two mountain passes in the Rockies, the tallest of which was at about 11,600 feet. Sasha (the car) was not impressed. Once we got up over about 8,500 feet she was struggling. Joe just had to drop her down a couple gears and give her some extra gas but she made it. She did real good :)

We finally rolled into Denver about 10:30 Friday night, very tired and ready to be out of the car and very thankful that our friends Eric & Trey had a hot tub :)

After the hot tub and chocolate cake it was off to bed in the cool Rocky Mtn night air ahhhh....

Sightseeing in SLC

We had a great day of sightseeing in SLC yesterday. Started the day off with a nice run around the city and then headed out to see the Great Salt Lake. Stinky!! Rhett said the smell reminded him of the salt marshes back home. We drove out to the south end of the lake to this place called Saltair. It's this huge historic mosque-inspired building that was a gathering place where people used to come in the early 1900's. Back then, the shoreline of the lake was much closer than it is now. The building used to actually sit on the water. Now it's probably a couple hundred yards from it. The building has gone through many renovations over the years. It was a theme park at one time with roller coasters and such, and then a dance hall...now it houses a small gift shop. It's still very cool to see.

About a mile west of there is the Saltair boat ramp. We got out of the car and then quickly got back in the car after noticing the hundred, yes, HUNDREDS of orb-weaving spiders. Apparently the spiders come out in hordes like that from time to time when the salinity in the lake is high and/or the gnats are in great numbers, and they were. We still got great shots of the lake, but we did it quick and hit it.

Then it was on to the 2002 Olympic Site up at the University of Utah. It was cool to see the Olympic cauldron, and of course Rhett had to get pics of another football stadium :) Afterwards we drove a little further up on the hill and visited the "This Is The Place" monument. This site commemorates the Mormon's entrance into the Salt Lake valley. It was a really neat place to visit. Lots of historical monuments and statues, as well as some great views of the valley.

Next it was off to Temple Square. We noticed on our drive there that the crosswalks in Utah all have these bright orange flags in buckets on each side of the street. Apparently, you're supposed to grab a couple flags a walk with them when you cross the street. Only in Utah lol. Rhett was really amused by this (see video). Rhett really wanted to hear the Mormon Tabernacle Choir sing, but the weren't practicing yesterday :( However, we were able to listen to an organ recital in the Conference Center which was very impressive. The organ is amazing.

About 4:00 we met up with Joe's friend Elizabeth and her two sons at this large outdoor mall. The thunderstorm had passed at this point so the sun was shining again and it was hot! We had some frozen yogurt and caught up on the past 11 years since we'd last seen each other.

After that we had had enough sightseeing for awhile and headed back to the hotel for a nap. Then it was off to check out the hoppin' nightlife of SLC. Went to this club called Jam and met a few locals. Had some good conversation and laughs and then drove up on this bluff for some incredible nighttime views of the valley.

Today we got up, hit the gym, and now it's off for the 9ish hour drive to Denver!

Here we are Salt Lake!

Well we're almost 1,000 miles from Portland. The drive from Boise was great. Saw some cool things. Left Boise during a crazy thunderstorm so the first few miles were through pouring rain. Stopped at the Malad Gorge State Park and then took a little detour and had lunch in Twin Falls. Entering Twin Falls, you cross over the Snake River that's meandering through this amazingly wide, deep gorge that's right on the edge of the city. Pretty cool sight!

Cruised into Salt Lake about 5:30 and had dinner at the Red Rock Brewing Company with an old friend of Rhett's from high school who he hadn't seen in like 18 years. It was great fun for them to catch up. Afterwards we found the local 24 Hour Fitness and had a great workout. Felt sooooo good to do some lifting after all that time in the car.

Tomorrow it's a day of sight-seeing. Probably head out to see the Great Salt Lake and then tour around Temple Square and afterwards we're meeting up with my friend Liz! Excited to see her!

Leaving Boise-Day 3

Well here we go again leaving Boise. So Rhett being the sports nut decided this morning we were gonna get on the blue field of the Boise St Broncos so he talked his way out and got some pics. It was like a kid in the candy store. We got our postcards and mailed them to the parents and got free potato pins to wear....fun times.


The bagels we had at the Blue Sky bagel place were soooo good that we got one additional one for the road and then came the morning adventure! WHEATGRASS shots!! Yeah too early for alcoholic shots so this was our answer. It's like 2.5 lbs of veggies in 1oz and yes it tastes like smashed pea pods right Joe??(can't insert movie til later)

So with all that we are on the road in some crazy weather.



Next destination mormon nation or as Rhett refers to it the land of the khaki pants(really it's gotta be highest per capita) :) Salt Lake City.

Stay tuned

-J&R
Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Mountain Home,United States